transitions cannot be applied between roles

Ran into a problem today. Wondering if this is something I'm doing wrong, a bug, or a feature.

I've been using "roles" to tag videos. For what I'm currently doing, the role colors and the sorting capability really helps in the timeline.

However, I just learned that a transition cannot be applied across two video clips with different roles. 

Clips are adjacent. There's enough extra frames. If the two clips have different video roles applied, the transition will only be applied to ONE of the clips. Change the two clips to the same role, and the transition is applied as expexpected.

What's more odd is that after the transition is applied, I can change the roles back so the two clips are different, without affecting the already applied transition.

Is this a bug, a feature, or user error?

What you've experienced is a feature, not a bug. I can confirm the behavior.

I guess that the explanation for this behavior is that when you show roles and lanes via the timeline index (and alternatively expand subroles), it's about as close as FCP gets to having "tracks". And, with the separate lanes/tracks, you can imagine trying to apply a transition to two clips on different tracks (or lanes in FCP).

So, when clips have different roles, they aren't really adjacement in terms of roles, even if they are adjacent in the timeline.

I also noticed that when you apply a transition to two adjacent clips of different roles, when the clips are connected clips, the transition seems to be applied but the second clip is then converted into a connected storyline. You may just need to make allowances, i.e., adding a transition to each clip separately, as needed... a bit funky, but I guess it's a consequence of using roles in FCP.

Someone else may have a better explanation...  

I guess that kind of makes sense. I'm just glad it's not a problem with my system or FCP. 

It is strange that you can workaround this by simply assigning the same role to both clips, then apply the transition, then change the clips back to different roles.

jrm wrote:

I guess that kind of makes sense. I'm just glad it's not a problem with my system or FCP.

It is strange that you can workaround this by simply assigning the same role to both clips, then apply the transition, then change the clips back to different roles.

I'll admit that much of this is news to me... and thanks for providing all this info... it's very helpful...

I'd suggest that you take a look at the FCP user guide and the "roles" white paper for info about using roles:

Audio Roles White Paper

I'm going to re-read the white paper and scan the manual again, as I don't recall reading about this stuff, nor have I seen mention of this in any of the formal training I've had, or any YT, etc., videos...